Mary Lyon Medal 2025 Prof Kathy Niakan

The Genetics Society is delighted to announce Prof Kathy Niakan, University of Cambridge, as the winner of the 2025 Mary Lyon Medal.

Kathy Niakan is Mary Marshall and Arthur Walton Professor of the Physiology of Reproduction and Director of the Loke Centre for Trophoblast Research at the University of Cambridge. She is also Co-Chair of the Cambridge Reproduction Interdisciplinary Research Centre. From 2021, Kathy has been an Honorary Group Leader at the Babraham Institute and an Affiliate Member of the Cambridge Stem Cell Institute.

Kathy’s laboratory pioneered approaches to investigate the function of genes that regulate early human development and the molecular mechanisms that direct cell fate in human embryos. Her laboratory is interested in understanding the genes and signalling pathways that regulate the divergence of embryonic versus placenta and yolk-sac cells in human development. Her laboratory obtained the first nationally regulated approval to genetically modify human embryos in research which attracted widespread policy interest. This research licence was acquired as part of the permanent collection at the Science Museum in London, where scientific objects from the laboratory have also been exhibited. Her laboratory seeks to improve the clinical treatment of infertility and developmental disorders, and her work in scientific policy and advocacy informs the ethical use of human embryos and stem cells in research and medicine.

Kathy obtained a B.Sc. in Cell and Molecular Biology and a B.A. in English Literature from University of Washington. She obtained her PhD at University of California, Los Angeles, supported by a National Institutes of Health Pre-doctoral Training Grant, Paul D. Boyer Fellowship and a Chancellor’s Dissertation Year Fellowship. She undertook postdoctoral training at Harvard University where she developed an interest in early human development. She was a Loke Centre for Trophoblast Research Next Generation Research Fellow at University of Cambridge. In 2013 she started her laboratory with a focus on mechanisms regulating early human development at the MRC National Institute for Medical Research and subsequently the Francis Crick Institute.

Kathy was a Blavatnik Award UK Finalist in Life Sciences (2019) and elected to EMBO membership (2024).